Sea Turtle Eggs

WATCHING A NATURE SHOW this evening, in which the practice sea turtles have of laying eggs on beaches to hatch at the full moon, it occurs to me…

A group of sea turtles will lay thousands of eggs. Five percent make it to the water. The other ninety-five percent get killed and eaten by predators and scavengers. It’s a part of nature. By this, the predators and scavengers get fed — at least one meal. It’s not what the system is designed for, and the turtles as a species would probably be better off if more babies survived. The system is designed to reproduce the turtle. The rest is mere by-product. The very definition of collateral damage.

Photo: Bernard Gagnon, 2006. Wikimedia Commons

A business might employ thousands of people. As has been demonstrated here recently in the Twinkie situation, frequently, a business can survive and deliver its product employing substantially fewer people. Which is a desirable state of affairs. The business does not exist to employ people. That is, rather, a collateral benefit. But the business will not survive if its employment costs are beyond what its sales can support.

And, of course, the same is true of governmental entities.

These are fundamental economic lessons. Lessons which the so-called ruling elites of the world seem to have either forgotten or never learned in the first place.

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